An Old Testament scholar has discovered that a seal found in 1964 and dating from the 9th century BCE belonged to the biblical figure Queen Jezebel. The seal's symbols served as the basis for Korpel's conclusion.

  As the weather turns colder, dry skin becomes a common problem for most people. Most lotions and creams contain one or both of the following agents - an oily agent and a watery agent. A little background on the make-up of skin creams would make selecting the right cream easier.

  Scientists have new information that may help to improve the use of anti-cancer drugs designed to block the growth of new blood vessels in tumors, a process called angiogenesis that is critical to tumor growth. While these antiangiogenic drugs are effective, at present there are no reliable methods for determining whether they are working, if the right dose is used, or if a patient will benefit from treatment.

  Soils may dictate the array of fall colors as much as the trees rooted in them, according to a forest survey out of North Carolina. By taking careful stock and laboratory analyses of the autumn foliage of sweetgum and red maple trees along transects from floodplains to ridge-tops in a nature preserve in Charlotte, N.C., scientists found that in places where the soil was relatively low in nitrogen and other essential elements, trees produced more red pigments known as anthocyanins.

  While some targeted therapies -- drugs developed to attack specific molecules in the critical chemical pathways occurring within cancer cells -- work well by themselves, increasingly researchers are finding that they work better when teamed with other targeted and conventional therapies.

  An open-access commentary in the December 2007 issue of Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology examines a recently launched a global initiative by the World Health Organization to combat healthcare-associated infection by improving hand hygiene in health care. The commentary is part of the Global Theme Issue on Poverty and Human Development.

  Antibiotics are not justified to reduce the risk of complications after upper respiratory tract infection, sore throat, or ear infection, finds a study published on the British Medical Journal web site.

  In a rapid follow-up to their achievement as the first to demonstrate how an electron's spin can be electrically injected, controlled and detected in silicon, electrical engineers from the University of Delaware and Cambridge NanoTech now show that this quantum property can be transported a marathon distance in the world of microelectronics -- through an entire silicon wafer. The finding confirms that silicon -- the workhorse material of present-day electronics -- now can be harnessed up for new-age spintronics applications.

  Mankind's closest living relatives -- the world's apes, monkeys, lemurs and other primates -- are under unprecedented threat from destruction of tropical forests, illegal wildlife trade and commercial bushmeat hunting, with 29 percent of all species in danger of going extinct, according to a new report.

  Why do some people solve problems more creatively than others? Are people who think creatively different from those who tend to think in a more methodical fashion? Scientists found a distinct pattern of brain activity, even at rest, in people who tend to solve problems with a sudden creative insight -- an "Aha! Moment"-- compared to people who tend to solve problems more methodically.

  Questions about human migration from Asia to the Americas have perplexed anthropologists for decades, but as scenarios about the peopling of the New World come and go, the big questions have remained. Do the ancestors of Native Americans derive from only a small number of "founders"who trekked to the Americas via the Bering land bridge? How did their migration to the New World proceed? What, if anything, did the climate have to do with their migration? And what took them so long?

  A newborn's chance for surviving a low-risk version of a condition called gastroschisis varies greatly by hospital, according to a new study. The uncomplicated variant of the condition, where the hole is the only abdominal anomaly, is fairly easy to repair, and 97 percent of babies survive it. Some hospitals had death rates three to five times the national average.

  For the first time, a new screening method shows promise for identifying new human tumor viruses, as well as determining which cancers are caused by infection and which are not. Statistics now show that infection contributes to over 20% of human cancers worldwide. Presently, the list of confirmed carcinogenic infectious agents is short, however studies suggest that new infectious agents yet to be identified contribute to a wide range of diseases, including cancers.

  Scientists from developing countries are vitally important in the fight against HIV and they must be given the proper resources to conduct their work, according to a new commentary published today in the journal Nature Immunology. Researchers from Imperial College London, who are evaluating multiple candidate vaccines designed to prevent HIV, argue that Western governments and funding agencies must commit to sharing technology and expertise with those in the developing world on a long-term basis.